Twelve days before the
deadline, on 9 May 2002, Sven-Göran Eriksson
picked a provisional 23-man squad for the World Cup Finals with
Liverpool's Danny Murphy on standby. Two days later, Newcastle
United's Kieron Dyer (strained medial knee ligaments) and
Liverpool's Steven Gerrard (groin) picked up injuries in their
final league games of the season. The squad then travelled to
Dubai on 13 May, with Murphy deputising for his club mate and
West Ham United's Trevor Sinclair joining the party as standby
for Dyer. Eriksson had surprisingly overlooked Real Madrid's
Steve McManaman, who was set to win his second Champions League
winners medal, two days later.

When Eriksson submitted his final
squad list on 21 May, Gerrard (who needed an operation on his
groin), was excluded, but Dyer was named in the squad,
desperately trying to prove that his knee would be up to the
task. England still had until June 1 to make any changes to
their squad due to late injuries. Sinclair, meanwhile, remained
on standby, but flew home to his pregnant wife, despite Eriksson
asking him to stay with the squad, which was now in South Korea
and about to head to Japan for a final warm-up match against
Cameroon.

There was a further twist on the
very next day, when Murphy fell awkwardly in training. Just like
Beckham (still recovering) and Gary Neville (withdrawn) before
him, he had broken a metatarsal and the newest member of the
squad was out, with just over a week to go to England's first
game. Incredibly, having just completed a 6,000-mile journey
home because the injured Dyer had been picked ahead of him,
Trevor Sinclair was summoned to re-join the squad in Japan as a
replacement for Murphy, the original standby.

With David Beckham and Nicky Butt
also recovering from injuries to add to the concerns over Dyer,
Eriksson was moved to add two more players, from England's
European Under-21 Championship squad, on standby. These were
Alan Smith of Leeds United and David Dunn of Blackburn Rovers,
who had both impressed during the recent tournament in
Switzerland.

As it transpired, no more
replacements were necessary. Beckham and Dyer appeared in the
first game and Butt played in the second, whilst the endurance
demonstrated by Sinclair's multiple long-haul flights was
rewarded with four World Cup appearances for the winger.